


Irregular Edges

by recrudescence



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Community: fandom_stocking, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-08
Updated: 2011-01-08
Packaged: 2017-10-14 13:44:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/149810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/recrudescence/pseuds/recrudescence
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eames always follows up with his clients.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Irregular Edges

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Enigel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enigel/gifts).



Eames always follows up with his clients.

He has no quarrel with disappearing if they prefer him to, but if at all possible he makes a point of keeping connections that could prove to be beneficial.

This isn't the entire reason he decides to look in on Saito, but it is part of it.

They aren't ready to be flush with success yet—Arthur wants to trail Fischer for a little while first—but the glee and giddiness of a job well done is there anyway. Each member of the team is ensconced in a different hotel, scheduled to leave on different days and flights in order to minimize attention, but Eames knows where to look.

Cobb's confronted his demons, but Saito's confronted more than he realized was possible.

When Eames finds him, he's brooding in his rooms. Still in his suit, minus the jacket, staring out the window and looking as if he hasn't moved for a long time. He doesn't seem particularly surprised when Eames comes through the door, but he's in no hurry to acknowledge him either.

Making conversation under adverse conditions is nothing new to Eames. “So, it's back home for you, isn't it? I've only ever been to Okinawa, not counting a few misspent layovers in Tokyo.”

The look Saito gives him is so dismissive it's almost insulting. “You should leave, Mr. Eames.”

Eames rocks on the balls of his feet and stares at the ceiling for a few seconds, waiting to see if Saito intends to summon a phalanx to have him escorted out. “I'm not prepared to do that,” he admits, when there seems to be no sign of this happening. “Have you eaten?”

“I believe I did.” Saito's gaze is fixated on the sunset again and he still doesn't seem to be entirely present.

There's a room service cart near the door, containing a covered tray and a champagne bucket, both of which appear untouched. Eames ignores the former and hones in on the latter. “Excellent. Then how about we honour our triumph?”

And maybe Saito doesn't so much as glance at him when he accepts a glass, but he does accept it.

“You know, you're the least gauche tourist I've ever known.”

Saito actually looks amused. “Thank you. I'm glad to know I have one thing going for me.”

“How much time had passed before Cobb found you?”

He doesn't expect an answer. They sip their champagne in silence for a long while.

“Too much,” says Saito. He sounds exhausted.

“I was wrong about you,” Eames says, after a stretch of time punctuated only by the ticking of his watch. “We did need you, more than I expected. I thought you'd be nothing but a hindrance—“

“I was,” Saito interrupts, and there's a drollness to his tone. “Don't you remember? I died.“

Eames staves off any further contradictions with a shake of his head. “No one, _no one_ goes under like you did. Not for something that has no precedent whatsoever. No one's that brave. This business is about paying others to do the dirtiest possible work for you while you keep your own hands clean.”

“My hands haven't been clean for a very long time.”

“Speaking of, no offence, but you should at least treat yourself to a shower. I'll run you a bath.”

“That won't be necessary.”

“Come on, you can't sit up all night like this. Your life is too important for that. Career criminals might be able to pick and choose, but people like you have to be clean-cut and professional in the morning.”

He locates the bathroom and proceeds to do just what he offered, and if ever there was a time for Saito to have him removed from the premises this would be it. But all Eames hears is a sigh, a rustle of cloth, and the sound of Saito stepping into the shower enclave. “I don't believe I hired you for this,” Saito tells him over the hiss of water.

“I don't believe you hired me for a good many things, but I've done them anyway. Not that I'm this agreeable to everyone who signs my paychecks.”

“I never signed anything for you.”

“Maybe not that you know of.” There's a heavy silence from the bathroom as Eames returns to the sitting area and helps himself to more champagne. “Joking.”

He isn't sure, but he thinks he hears Saito laugh.

“Anyhow, being trained against extractors is very different from actually undertaking something as complicated as we all pulled off. I'd be surprised if you didn't come out of it a little shaken.”

The shower ceases and there's the sound of Saito relocating to the bathtub. “I'm not shaken,” Saito says.

Eames smiles. “I am.”

He doesn't bother arguing. Someone as wealthy and influential as Saito must not have much experience with stepping down or admitting weakness or being anything but ruthless. But Saito could have shown him the door anytime and didn't. And maybe he only intended it as a courtesy to a colleague, but Eames thinks it's really because he isn't ready to be alone again. Not that he can find any fault with that whatsoever. Limbo is something professionals are never supposed to encounter, let alone civilians.

Across the room, he can see Saito reclined in the ridiculously opulent tub, watching him through the half-open door. “I've noticed, your watch looks valuable.”

“I wouldn't be much good at my job if it didn't.”

“Then I recommend removing it. As well as your shoes and any noteworthy trinkets in your pockets.”

Eames sets down his glass. “Why is that?”

“Because in ten seconds I'm going to ask you to come here.”

“Are you?”

Saito's eyes are closed. Eames's watch ticks out the time as he removes it. “Come here, Mr. Eames.”

Lounging in the enormous sunken tub, Saito looks weary—more so as Eames approaches; there are lines around his mouth that he doesn't recall noticing before—but his eyes are shrewd when he opens them again, dark and glinting like agates. “You turned out to be the most honest of anyone. I had somewhat guarded expectations based on the results of the last team Cobb assembled.”

“It's been an honour doing business with you, Mr. Saito,” Eames tells him, and he means every word. Saito isn't the most dangerous man he's ever worked for, but he commands respect without ostentation.

The words are hardly out of his mouth before Saito knots a fist in the front of his shirt and kisses him.

The fabric soaks through almost instantly.

“I can't forge for you now,” Eames reminds him, caught off balance both physically and mentally, and Saito only laughs and says it doesn't matter, then catches him around the waist and _pulls_.

Everything about him is precise and certain and exquisite, even his impatience.

Saito's fingers scrabble at his clothes, shirt buttons scatter, and Eames doesn't have a chance to even pretend to protest before Saito snorts, “I could make a phone call and have as many shirts as you like at the door in fifteen minutes, if that's really what you want,” and Eames is reminded yet again that there's definitely something nice about having an employer who's above the law and not hiding from it.

“No,” Eames manages to say before his lips are otherwise occupied, “it's not.”

Saito's mouth leaves brands of pleasure up his chest and neck. His hands are quick with the fastenings on Eames's trousers and his teeth are sure and sharp against his lips.

When Eames touches him, Saito's chest and abdomen are flat and taut under his palm—no blood, no bullet, just smooth unharmed flesh—and Saito sighs as if he's dying all over again, furrows appearing in his brow like hairline cracks in porcelain.

The jets from the tub thrum over his skin. Saito gasps and pushes up into his touch, wherever it happens to land, and there's water all over the floor but it drains efficiently enough that Eames assumes there's not too much danger of slipping and bashing their brains out. There are several ways in which he's prepared to die, but this isn't one of them.

Somehow or other, the two of them lever each out out of the bathtub without actually pulling apart. Eames's mouth is sore and his slacks cling to his legs; he barely manages to peel them off in time. The robes on hand look decadently soft, but they both bypass them entirely and it doesn't matter that the bed beneath them ends up damp because there's an identical one right beside it for them to utilize as they touch and take and curse until there's no more damage to be done.

Saito's wet hair catches around his fingers and his mouth is almost fever-hot on Eames's, tongue pressing inside over and over as his thigh presses between Eames's legs. Each guttural-desperate sound he utters gets swallowed up by Eames's mouth before having a chance to be properly voiced.

Eames lets him have what he wants, but he also gives back. “You can't always keep the upper hand,” he murmurs into Saito's ear, and Saito opens his mouth to answer but Eames doesn't give him the chance. He urges him open until there's no trace of composure left, running both hands over the arch of his cock and the curves of his ribs and the bow of his spine, learning the ways he fits together and the ways he comes apart.

When he finally does, it's magnificent.

Saito falls asleep far more quickly than he would have alone, Eames is absolutely sure of this.


End file.
